Meet Huawei's newest big phones, the Ascend P8 and P8max

Huawei introduced a pair of phones running a custom interface on top of Google Android 5.0 at a Wednesday launch event in London. The two handsets are a follow up to last year's Ascend P7 model, sharing similar aspects such as Huawei's own processor inside.

The new Ascend P8 has a 5.2-inch display while the Ascend P8max ups the screen size to 6.8-inches, or roughly the size of small tablet.

Both are thin devices: The standard P8 measures 6.5 millimeters in depth and the larger P8max is only slightly thicker at 6.8 millimeters. The phones each use Huawei's own Hisilicon Kirin 930, an 8-core 64bit processor with a 2.0GHz clock speed. That chip is paired with 3GB of memory and a choice of storage capacity in either 16 or 64GB, along with a microSD card for additional storage expansion.

Each share the same 1920 x 1080 screen resolution as well. A 13-megapixel camera with optical image stabilization is on the back of both phones but the smaller P8 has a higher resolution, 8-megapixel front camera sensor compared to the P8max and its 5-megapixel front sensor.

One unique aspect here is an e-paper on the back of the P8. Based on Huawei's description is sounds like an optional cover that attaches to the phone so that you can read an e-book or see other information from the phone without running down the battery too quickly. The pair of phones have decent batteries inside regardless: The P8 power pack has a 2680mAh capacity while the larger P8max has a 4360mAh battery.

If you live in the U.S. like I do, don't get too excited about either of these phones just yet. Huawei says the P8 will start at €499 for the 16GB version -- the 64GB model will cost €599 -- when it becomes available in 30 countries; the U.S. isn't on that list but that could change in the future. The bigger phone comes with a larger price tag as you'd expect. It will start at €549 when it goes on sale in the coming weeks.